Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd.

Fuji Photo Film Company, Limited

Sadao Okano

Takahiro Suzuki

Yusuke Kitagawa

Seiji Ashiya

Akiko Kimura

Masanori Murase

Koji Bando

Yasuo Takayama

Yoshio Kanesawa

Michiaki Yasuno

Makoto Omata

Kiyotaka Ishikawa

Motoi Noya

Fumio Daishi

Masahiko Hodumi

Kazuhisa Masuko

Shinichi Utsumi

Hideaki Seikiguchi

Yoshio Tani

Ryosaku Igarashi

Taketoshi Hoshizaki

Kazuya Hongo

Hiroshi Miyamoto

Yasutomo Goto

Yoshiyuki Ono

Kazuhito Miyake

Masataka Murata

Shigeto Hashiba

Hidekazu Aonuma

A charging device includes a first cleaning member that cleans a surface of a charging wire by moving along the wire while being in contact with the wire at a first side; and a second cleaning member that cleans the surface of the wire by moving while being in contact with the wire at a second side, and moving relative to the first cleaning member in a crossing direction that crosses a wire length direction.

Charging device including first and second cleaning members for cleaning a charging wire

A charging device includes an electrode, a cleaning member that moves along the electrode and cleans the electrode, a rotating member that is disposed along the electrode, includes a spiral protruding portion on an outer circumferential surface thereof, and circumferentially rotates, and a movable member to which the cleaning member is attached. The movable member includes a first through hole through which the rotating member passes, a first pressed portion that is provided on an inner circumferential surface of the first through hole and pressed by the protruding portion of the rotating member, and a second pressed portion that is disposed at a different position from a position of the first pressed portion in an axial direction of the rotating member and that is disposed such that one or more turns of the protruding portion are positioned between the second pressed portion and the first pressed portion.

Charging device and image forming apparatus including movable member to which cleaning member is attached

A charging device includes a first cleaning member, a first electrode, a second cleaning member, a second electrode, and a movable body. The first cleaning member moves in one direction. The first electrode is cleaned by the first cleaning member moving in the one direction. The second cleaning member moves in the one direction together with the first cleaning member and moves so that a downstream end portion thereof, which is located downstream in the one direction, serves as a leading portion and an upstream end portion thereof comes after the downstream end portion. The second electrode includes a first region and a second region. The first region is cleaned by the second cleaning member moving in the one direction. The second region is located downstream in comparison with the first region in the one direction.

Charging device including cleaning member and image forming apparatus

A charging device includes: an electrode; a cleaning member that cleans the electrode; a moving body that moves along the electrode, the cleaning member that is attached to the moving body; and a rotation member that is disposed along the electrode and that includes a spiral protrusion on an outer circumferential surface thereof to move the moving body, the rotation member that is rotated in a circumferential direction. A plurality of kinds of pitch intervals of the protrusion are provided on at least a central portion of the rotation member in a longitudinal direction.

Charging device and image forming apparatus having a rotation member with a spiral protrusion

In the image forming process of the present invention wherein a toner is fixed on an electrophotographic image-receiving sheet using a belt fixing and smoothing device, the relationship among the temperature of a heating and fixing roller, the melting point of a toner wax, and the glass transition point of a toner binder, the relationship among the temperature of a heating and fixing roller, the melting point of a wax in the image-receiving layer, and the glass transition point of a binder in the image-receiving layer, and the relationship between the polar components of surface free energy of the toner-image-receiving layer before and after image fixing are optimized. The present invention is to prevent offset in the toner and the toner-image-receiving layer of the electrophotographic image-receiving sheet upon releasing of the belt and to avoid deterioration in image quality especially in operation over the long run.

Image forming process and image forming apparatus

Provided is an image forming process which can effectively suppress the occurrence of separation electrification between a belt surface layer and an image-receiving layer of an electrophotographic image-receiving sheet at a cooling and separation unit, prevent dust from adsorbing to charges at each surface thereof, and print high quality images having near-photographic quality, in which a belt-fixing smoothing device having a heating and pressuring member, a belt member, a cooling device, and a cooling and separating unit is used to conduct fixing treatment to an electrophotographic image-receiving sheet. In this case, a surface resistivity (SR) of one side of the image-receiving sheet on which an image is formed satisfies the formula 1.0&#xd7;10&#x3a9;/cm&#x2266;SR&#x2266;1.0&#xd7;10&#x3a9;/cm, and a surface resistivity (SR) of one side of the belt member which becomes in contact with the image satisfies the formula SR&#x2266;1.0&#xd7;10&#x3a9;/cm.

In a fuser, a cooling structure ( ) is disposed so that a bend angle (&agr;) of a part bent during the time between an endless belt ( ) coming in contact with a press cooling face ( ) of the cooling structure ( ) and exiting from the press cooling face ( ) is placed in the range of 0&deg; C.<&agr;&lE;7&deg; C. A fixing belt has a minute hardness of 0.1 to 5 at least on the belt surface coming in contact with toner T and preferably has a gloss degree of 75 or more on the belt surface.

Fixing belt and fuser

In a fuser, a cooling structure ( ) is disposed so that a bend angle (&agr;) of apart bent during the time between an endless belt ( ) coming in contact with a press cooling face ( ) of the cooling structure ( ) and exiting from the press cooling face ( ) is placed in the range of 0&deg; C.<&agr;&lE;7&deg; C. A fixing belt has a minute hardness of 0.1 to 5 at least on the belt surface coming in contact with toner T and preferably has a gloss degree of 75 or more on the belt surface.

A method for determining a termination time of the step of dispersing a coating composition for a photosensitive layer, containing a binder resin, a powdery charge generating material and a solvent, is disclosed, which comprises (i) providing coating (I) on a substrate by coating the coating composition, following by drying, (ii) providing coating (II) on a substrate by dispersing the coating composition using a dispersion medium to fine the powdery charge generating material, followed by drying, (iii) measuring absorbances of coating (I) at two wavelengths within a short wavelength region and a long wavelength region, respectively, of the spectral absorption wavelength of the charge generating material, (iv) measuring absorbances of coating (II) at the two wavelengthes within the short wavelength region and the long wavelength region, respectively, and (v) calculating spectral absorbance ratios of coatings (I) and (II), respectively, from the following equation: ##EQU1## wherein the dispersing of the coating composition is terminated when the ratio of the spectral absorbance ratio of coating (II) to that of coating (I) exceed a predetermined value.

Method for determining termination time of the step of dispersing a

An electrophotographic photoreceptor comprising a conductive substrate having thereon a photosensitive layer as the uppermost layer, in which the photosensitive layer contains two charge transporting materials different in ionization potential, a charge transporting material having a higher ionization potential is present in the amount equimolar to or in an amount less than the equimolar amount to the other charge transporting material having a lower ionization potential. A laminate type electrophotographic photoreceptor comprising a conductive substrate having thereon a charge generating layer and a charge transporting layer, in which the charge generating layer comprises a binder resin and a charge generating material dispersed therein, the charge transporting layer comprises a binder resin and at least two charge transporting materials including a first charge transporting material and a second charge transporting material, the amount of the first charge transporting material is at least 60 wt % based on the total amount of the charge transporting materials, the difference between the highest ionization potential and the lowest ionization potential the charge transporting materials is not more than 0.4 eV, provided that (1) the ionization potentials of all the charge transporting materials are lower than the ionization potential of the charge generating material, or (2) the ionization potential of the first charge transporting material is lower than the ionization potential of the charge generating material, and the ionization potential of the second charge transporting material is higher than the ionization potential of the charge generating material by at least 0.2 eV.

Electrophotographic photoreceptor

A novel method for preparing an electrophotographic photoreceptor is disclosed, which comprises laminating a charge generating layer and a charge transporting layer in this order on an electrically conductive substrate via an undercoating layer, wherein the coating solution for said undercoating layer contains an alkoxide coupling agent represented by formula (I), an aliphatic alcohol solvent containing at least the same number of carbon atoms as in the alkoxy group in said alkoxide coupling agent, and at least one compound selected from the group consisting of aromatic solvents, ethylene glycols and propylene glycols:

Method for preparing an electrophotographic photoreceptor

A novel electrophotographic photoreceptor is disclosed, comprising an undercoating layer provided on an electrically conductive substrate having thereon a light-sensitive layer, wherein the undercoating layer is obtained by coating a solution of a composition comprising zirconium and silicon or a solution of a mixture of a zirconium acetyl acetonate compound and a silane coupling agent, the silicon content in the composition comprising zirconium and silicon is in the range of 5 to 35 mol % based on the total amount of zirconium and silicon, and the hardened undercoating layer obtained from the zirconium acetyl acetonate compound and silane coupling agent is a layer having a hardening degree of 1.2 or less.

Electrophotographic photoreceptor having a zirconium and

An electrophotographic light-sensitive material is disclosed, which comprises a conductive support having formed thereon, in succession, a charge generating layer and a charge transfer layer, wherein the charge generating layer comprises a binder resin containing therein a positive hole-transferring charge generating pigment and a specific dicyanovinyl compound or coumarin compound. An image forming process using the electrophotographic light-sensitive material is also disclosed.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Sadao Okano